How Tough Are You?

For you, AKTodd; set up:​

Spoiler

You, good sir, are so eerily like myself. I shivered with pure deja vu, particularly the part I've quoted, reading that.

To copy and paste something, which explains my approach to life:​

The rare opportunity somebody outwits or outplays me, they had best savor that victory. It ain't happening twice, I can guaran-damn-tee that! You stall my desires, you're going to quickly make yourself a problem -- and I obliterate problems; I don't have time for that nonsense. I have places to be, people to meet, and dreams to fulfill (one of my life mottos). It's one thing to have the means to keep me down, but if you're challenging the notion I lack the will or resources to achieve my ambitions, then you have a choice:

Move or be moved.​

I'm cocky, but I'm willing to let another have the floor or speak up. I'm clever, but I'm capable of letting another offer insight or knowledge, even if it means admitting I'm not up to par (and I FUCKING hate this, just being useless in general). It will make me better, and perhaps even allow me a new friend. At worst, I have a contact and I'm a little more prepared, and at best, I have a friend and I'm a little more prepared with back up.

Besides, I'll have my moments to shine. I can be awesome only 95% of the time. <3

"That's cute and all, Kaiser, but what does this have to do with being tough?"
I'm glad you asked!​

I can relate to this, quite a bit. It's pretty amusing, almost like seeing myself from a third-person perspective.

There's no ill will towards people who are depressed or venting, no lack of understanding towards people who are crying or angry. What irritates me, when I do allow myself to cry (which I will fight tooth and nail against), is it lasting for about a day. At best, half a day. And it's a waste of time (to me -- it's something I'm still working on when it comes to me; for others, well, I see myself more of a protector or enforcer, so there is a self-imposed higher standard), because I'm not fixing the problem or investing that time into something more productive. Aside from my parents and sister, when I was a young child, I can count the number of people that have seen me publicly cry on two fingers. It just isn't something I do.

Also, my ego tells me to get back up. How can I expect anybody else to do so, when I'm not? I hate being denied or unable to do what I preach.

When the planets all align and somebody wounds me, I won't show it. I'll take that wound, how it stings, and store it, planning to get back to this later when I've had time to properly deal with it. Basically, if your goal is to emotionally rile me up, you had best be a fucking master of manipulation, 'cause I'm not cracking. I'm not falling for that trick; the only one older is the "Hey, look!"-and-point-behind-me.

I wasn't a nice person, basically...​

Spoiler

In the past, I was quite malicious. I could hold a grudge for years, and formulate a plan at getting even with an unrivaled meticulousness. In recent years, that tendency to hold a grudge has been transformed into a desire to improve. The grudge is against any lack of progress or self-fulfillment as opposed to being against another directly, though if you are a superb asshole you may be a candidate for my total focus.

This, and... other reasons... are why enough look at me as being tough. It wouldn't be hard to find a few people to admit or agree about me being tough. But it isn't the positive kind of tough in their minds, since I don't share with them my more intimate issues. They know the basic and surface issues, and how I was in the past. It also helps that I look like somebody that could kick an entire bar's ass, to quote somebody. The only individual that does know, she'd vouch for me being the positive kind of tough, as she knows, on a deeper level, what I am experiencing. Not just what I casually let people know and figure out.

I've been analyzed as a coward, because my favorite tactic, years ago, was to gently pick away at the person. To make them into what I wanted, by chipping away their identity and placing my own fragments. This tactic was believed to be done, as I was incapable of standing toe to toe with actual conflict, to compensate for this. By the time the individual figured this out, they were isolated and distrusted. They could either be an outcast, subject to being picked on and excluded, or become my punching bag experiment until I discarded them for the next conquest. Typical predatory behavior, and another reason people I know mistake me for being tough, they were, back then, afraid of me, while today they're kind of tense towards me sometimes, not always.

The seldom times it happened, I enjoyed seeing somebody step up to me. I got to prove I wasn't a coward, because conflict never really bothered me. It's one thing to systematically dissect a person so far beyond genuineness, it even becomes a project of sorts as sinister as that sounds, but it is another to break a person's confidence in one fell swoop. Society likes to say, good will prevail just because it is good, and to deny that outcome to somebody gave me the utmost pleasure. Break the spirits, enslave obedience through hopelessness. Backing down wasn't something I did, and it isn't something I like to do nowadays...

I used to can have a problem with backing down, even if it was the safer or wiser option, because to do so meant losing my influence and power. People would begin to think and say, "So they do have a weakness!", or something to that effect. It didn't matter how many people I intimidated or hurt, they'd always have that image of me failing to reference.

In my late teens, though, reason prevailed. Backing down didn't mean being weak or incapable, it just means you've got to get better, to try harder next time. Even more so, not knowing the answer or being unable to remedy the scenario isn't the end of the world. If you can't do it personally, you find somebody who can. You ask for help not because you are useless, but because you know, together, you can kick the world's ass and whatever it hurls at you.

I'm egotistical clever. I used to can be arrogant. People mistook arrogance for being tough, but this is an illusion. See, arrogant-me would just intimidate, trick, or muscle my way through. Clever-me, now, analyzes the situation and decides if it is something I can handle or not, and if the latter, I immediately find somebody who can handle it. It's futile to try and go it alone, as much as I'd like to. This is when and where so many collapse due to stress or exhaustion, when really they should see it as an obvious sign, that it's time to get a team.

The fact I can admit my flaws makes me vulnerable, but it also instills in me pride. I may be helpless in certain areas or situations, but that's okay. I know where my opposition will strike, therefore I am ready -- and I will either overcome or leave one hell of a mark, you won't ever forget who fucked you up. I take pride in knowing I am ready.

How tough am I?

Tough enough to know I have my limits, and am willing to cooperate, to put aside my pride, to achieve success. But smart enough to know when and to who to share such details.

Sometimes... I am, after all, human.

As for what the most difficult thing to accept or do, for me, is... I've already typed enough, but...

It would probably be to stop allowing the world to influence me, and to begin influencing it. To cease letting my anger tell me what to do and when to feed it, where now I utilize it for what I want, as a fuel to propel myself into productivity. To stop being what was wrong with society, and to defy it.

I have a lot of ego and a bit of skill. Failure is possible, but I'm tough, I shall die with a laugh escaping my lips as opposed to a whimper. I control my life, who and what comes into it, how and where it does; and actually following through with this, makes me a badass motherfucker. Slightly vulnerable, but totally tough.

Come at me, Life.

<3